Book excerpt: "When people come to examine your conduct closely, every individual must be able to convince himself that it is possible to serve God in all states and conditions of life without the performance of great exterior penances, provided only one fight vigorously against one's passions and conforms oneself in all things to the holy will of God." These words of Our Lady to Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi convey the fundamental import of this book. Wife, Mother and Mystic is the story of Blessed Anna-Maria Taigi, a woman singled out at the age of twenty-one, to receive revelations from Our Lord and the Blessed Mother, which continued until her death. Despite these miraculous gifts, she was content to fulfill her station in life as a wife, and mother of seven children. Though her spiritual wisdom was sought after by the most prominent figures, she sought first to expiate the sins of her fellow men by performing her domestic duties with the utmost love and sacrifice. Wife, Mother and Mystic chronicles the events of an extraordinary life and yet, the great lesson of this biography is not found in the extraordinary, but in this modest woman's constant, hidden striving after holiness in her most ordinary tasks.